Literary and Cultural Theory Wiki
Welcome to the Literary and Cultural Theory Wiki During the Enlightenment Parisian salons were places for discussion and intellectual growth. After WWII sidewalk cafes assumed the role of meeting places for intellectuals and literati. This course will function as a salon or cafe, providing opportunities to discuss the history of literary theory, to play with ideas and watch as disciplinary thought develops, and to apply these theories to your own research and writing. This course is organized chronologically so that we can see the interplay between culture and theory, but we will also trace the development of specific themes over time. Describe your topic You will be randomly assigned one article over the course of the semester. You will be responsible, with a fellow student, for leading a class discussion about that article. Discuss the article’s relevance, historical context, and contribution to the field. You should also prepare a list of questions to prompt discussion. Each presenter is individually responsible for a 500-word essay explaining the article’s contribution to the ongoing course discussion. You must include a list of thematic micro-tags with your essay so that other students can quickly search responses by topic. Latest activity Audre Lorde- Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference Paige Landers Audre Lorde published “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” in the year 1984, and it’s relevance still today is striking. The battle for Women’s rights is raging on, with movements such as #MeToo and #TimesUp taking social media by storm. The fight against sexual assault, the fight for reproductive rights, the fight for equality continues on. Lorde argues that the most productive way to combat these issues is for women to come together. If we can look past the boundaries of age, race, class, sexual orientation and anything else that might divide us, we will be a more united front- a true force to be reckoned with. While it is important to band together as women, it is also necessary to note the different ways in which women navigate the world. Lorde’s experiences within the black community were shaped by her sexual orientation- other black women, her “sisters” turned against her, calling her “un-black”. Intersectionality matters! Intersectionality is defined as “the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage”. We have begun talking about intersectionality in class, as it is important for us to examine works like this through an intersectional lens, as well as it is important for us to self reflect. In The Souls of Black Folk, Du Bois says “One ever feels his twoness, -- an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder”. Why must these identities be kept separate? Refusing to consider the ways in which these different identities influence and interact with one another leads to ignorance. Seeing the world in only absolutes (black and white, gay or straight, etc) is a disservice to the diverse people living within it. We can learn a lot by taking the time to listen to the experiences of people that are different than us. As not only a woman, but also a black woman who is a member of the LGBTQ+ community, Lorde has firsthand experience. In “Age, Race, Class, and sex: Women Redefining Difference”, Lorde states that “It is not those differences between us that are separating us. It is rather our refusal to recognize those differences, and to examine the distortions which result from our misnaming them”. Discussing our differences and learning from them can enrich us as individuals and as a society. The idea that things that are different are inherently bad or scary is a notion that is simply not true, and it is time that we move past that concept. Society has ways of forcing us into boxes, of portraying women as the angel or the monster, as Gilbert and Gubar would say. We should have the choice to be both, to be neither, to be whatever we want to be! ' Lorde' Hannah Young Audre Lorde’s “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” is an important read and offers ideas and brings to light problems I had not recognized being a white female. Lorde explains that the largest opposition from a unified women’s movement comes from the women themselves. She argues that white women ignore the difference in race, which excludes black women from the movement. Lorde urges us to no longer ignore our differences in race, age, sex (and sexuality), and race, but rather embrace and learn about them. In class, we’ve not only spoke about problems of racism that we read about in works from Fannon and Du Bois, but we have also talked more recently about feminism and challenges women artists face in the male-dominated world of literature. Lorde points out that it is not acceptable to only look at male vs. female, black vs. white, etc. Rather, one must recognize that all parts (age, race, sex, and class) are interconnected. For example, when reading Audre Lorde, it is important to note that she is a female, lesbian, African American, and a socialist. All of these things influence her writing. She would want us to recognize these characteristics of hers but not use them to declare her as unfit to write or be listened to. Since people outside of the minority ignore or try to eliminate differences they are not accustom to, many will miss out on extraordinary works from that of LGBT and other minority writers. We spoke also of post-modernism, which looks at life with a more individual approach. Lorde demonstrates a post-modern view on life. She accounts for oppressions individuals face because of race, sex, class, age, etc. She would argue that it’s not accurate to write about one single “truth” because no one faces the same discrimination. Audre Lorde’s work is important to the course because it offers insights that many people might not have ever thought about—this makes it not only important for this course but also for life in general. Lorde tells us we can mend this divide by generating knowledge of differences and understanding differences. A quote that stuck out to me was one she used while explaining the difference between a white mother and an African American mother: “You fear your children will grow up to join the patriarchy and testify against you, we fear our children will be dragged from a car and shot down in the street, and you will turn your backs against the reasons they are dying.” The last part of this quotation really illustrates the divide among women because of race. While a woman can be a feminist, she can also be a racist, so what of the black women? We cannot turn our backs on the problems black women face due to race and claim to be a feminist. Being an activist for age, race, sex, and class must include being very holistic and accounting for all parts of oppression. Many, including myself, have not put much thought into such an issue and reading Lorde’s work would help solve this problem. Breaking Down the Madwoman in the Attic By: Taylor Swank Gilbert and Gubar created a conversation in the literary community with their joint essay “The Madwoman in the Attic.” The essay derives its name from the Jane Eyre story of Bertha Mason, a woman who is portrayed as an insane prisoner in the attic of her husband’s house. She had reasonable requests of her husband, to not sleep with the maids, and instead of saying, “Oh I can do that, that isn’t a crazy at all,” he said your insane and will now live in the attic. Cheery man. Therefore, Bertha essentially represents the imprisonment of 19th century female authors due to the male counterparts’ conceptions of them. Women were allowed two male invented masks to choose from, the angel or the fiend. This is the conversation that Gilbert and Gubar brought to the forefront of the female author revelation. Women writers of the 19th century were being scrutinized and ignored. They carried no weight and even when women were merely written about by men they were either in one of two categories, the angel or the monster. There was no in-between, a lot like the stereotypical thought that women are either a saint or a whore. Men thought that language itself was an alien among women, and we could not possibly have the capacity to cultivate and depict original and valid ideas. Gilbert and Gubar give tons of examples of this biased view of women and literary works in which women are portrayed exactly like this, an angel or a monstrosity. One of the greatest examples is Lilith. Lilith is said to have been the first wife of Adam, but when she refused to bow down to him and demanded to be his equal she was cast out. She essentially then became the Queen of Demons but was cursed and had to kill a 100 of her children each day. The point is that Lilith is the epitome of oppressed women. She represents the price women have been told they must pay in order to have an attempt at defining themselves their own way. For centuries women were thought of as placed on this earth to worship men and be angels and if you didn’t then you were a monster. All of a sudden Gilbert and Gubar were like, SIKE ladies, follow Liliths’ example and demand for the equality we deserve. Ultimately this essay did wonders for women. It proved that women writing works wasn’t an anomaly. It created a new outlook of appreciation for female writers and became greatly popular after its publication. Women loved that someone had finally said it, and had given them the voice and platform to continue to “stick it to the man.” Pun intended. This essay actually was so renowned that it was runner up for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critic Circle Award. This was an amazing accomplishment for female writers at this time. Gilbert and Gubar celebrated the differences in women’s writings and disbanded its original sexist definition. They preached that women should be able to write however they want without the pre-conceptions. The didn’t just start a conversation, they began a revolution. Microtags------Feminism, female writers Examining Sigmund Freud's The Uncanny By Anna Sollenberger In 1919, Sigmund Freud published an essay titled “The Uncanny”. Within this essay, Freud clearly defines what feelings are invoked under the guise of uncanniness. By defining what the uncanny is, he also clarifies what it isn’t. Bringing up the vernacular of the term, Freud disproves why this societal characterization is false in contrast to what he believes to be the correct usage of the idea. The common usage of the term “uncanny”, Freud observes, is a fear that coincides with entering into the unfamiliar. However, a logical fallacy is noted. As Freud states within the first paragraph of the excerpt “not everything which is new and unfamiliar is frightening, however; the relation cannot be inverted. He then goes on to enlist the usage of the German word “unheimlich” to define uncanniness. Utilizing a definition from a dictionary, he writes “''Unheimlich is the name for everything that ought to have remained…. hidden and secret and has become visible.” Freud uses this definition as a segue into the second half of his essay where he discusses ways in which the hidden human subconscious makes itself known. The second part to this excerpt is when Freud brings his own study of psychoanalysis into defining the uncanny. He recalls the short story ''The Sand-Man by E. T. A. Hoffmann. Freud again begins this deconstruction by dispelling a vernacular idea of uncanniness. The example provided is an instance in the narrative when a young man falls in love with an extremely life-like doll. Dismissing this instance of uncanniness, Freud focuses on an instance in the story when the protagonist is threatened by the Sand-Man who rips out children’s eyes. Being one who focuses on the subconscious, Freud equates the fear of losing one’s eyes with the act of castration. He states that this subconscious fear contributes to the uncanniness when being presented with this narrative. Freud expels any other interpretations of the fear of losing one’s eyes. By enlisting his trademark idea of the id, ego, and super ego, Freud claims that the uncanny feeling one gets when confronted with the threat of having eyes ripped out deals with the super ego associating this act with the act of castration. Therefore, the super ego feels threatened. Other ideas Freud presents within this essay are the ideas of the “double”, repetition compulsion, and desiring actions and impulses into being. The last of these deals with one stating that they wish an event will occur and then that very event happening soon after. He attributes this circumstance with the feeling of uncanniness. Freud’s writing on the uncanny has stirred up criticism in the literary community over the past decade. Most of the criticism is centered around Freud’s claims that a source for uncanniness is a fear of castration. Some feminist writers have claimed that Freud offers psychoanalytic insights that come from a place of male superiority. Although not highly focused on within his examination of the uncanny, Freud’s viewpoints on the dominance of male sexuality in the human subconscious can be used to discredit his claims about defining the uncanny. However, Freud offers a thorough deconstruction of the meaning to the term uncanny nonetheless. Sigmund Freud's "The Uncanny" Psychoanalysis; Unconscious thought; Impact of Past Experience Sigmund Freud, in his essay “The Uncanny,” offers his distinct interpretation of the phenomenon of uncanniness, which is a concept that has traditionally been thought to merely define something that does not exist in our minds. Therefore, it seems alien and unknown and is almost frightening due to its peculiarity and unidentifiable origin. However, Freud argues that the characteristics of the uncanny do not merely lie in that they are unfamiliar. Using his theories of psychoanalysis—that every human behavior or psychological disorder can be traced back to a person’s childhood events and sexual development—he tries to show that uncanniness is not something unfamiliar but is actually a hidden part of the unconscious that can come to light in a variety of ways. To further his argument, he points to many examples of the uncanny in literature such as instances when the most frightening moments for a character are not the most peculiar ones but ones that can signify past events from childhood or even just an unnatural reoccurrence of recent events. For example, Freud shows that the fate and unraveling of Nathaniel in “The Sand-Man” is not determined by his attraction to the doll, which is undoubtedly the most peculiar aspect of the story. Instead, he argues that the lawyer’s continued presence brings up past reservations that Nathaniel harbors regarding his father’s death. This, in turn, manifests itself as a fear of having his eyes gouged, which he argues is related to the fear of castration that arises in childhood. Ultimately, it was the conjuring of these unconscious thoughts that put Nathaniel in such distress. These are not things that are completely unknown, but they are hidden in our unconscious. This relates to Freud’s psychoanalytical theory that we are ultimately controlled by our unconscious desires, or id, and that our ego mediates between this id and the superego (cultural expectations) to result in our observed behavior. Also, throughout his essay, Freud points to instances where the strict definition of heimlich, or the uncanny, cannot coincide with its antonym unheimlich, which means unfamiliar or foreign. This is because the development of the definition of heimlich turns to something that is secret or hidden. However, if something is secret or hidden, how can it be unknown? For example, Freud speaks on the “double” phenomenon, which represents when our own egos are brought into consciousness by something similar to ourselves. This can exhibit the uncanny because it is showing something that was previously hidden (a perception of ourselves). Freud’s thinking in this essay can be applied to other essays that we have studied so far this semester. For example, Freud would argue that Gramsci’s view on hegemony can reach even further. He might project that the propaganda and cultural cues that comprise hegemony and power are not consciously heeded by the public. Instead, they may linger in our unconscious and control our behaviors without us even realizing that they are. In addition, Freud makes a different point about perception compared to Kant. While Kant argues that only time and space are the “a priori” elements, Freud would argue that all of our perception is influenced by unconscious thought instead of empirical findings. Finally, Freud may disagree with Nietzsche in that we do not have the power to will our own realities. Instead, our realities are shaped by past experience and unconscious reality. Overall, Freud’s interpretation of the uncanny represents a divergence from previous thought by emphasizing the role of the unconscious. - Connor Catlett Not A Dr. Seuss Text By: Josie Spitzer J.L. Austin was a British language philosopher whose beliefs were strongly influenced by Aristotle. Austin was born in 1911 and died in 1960. The excerpt we are reading from How To Do Things With Words was written during the mid to late fifties and published in 1962. At that time in Oxford, it was looked down upon to publish while you were living, so the notes and lectures Austin kept were published in the early sixties, about two years after his death. How To Do Things With Words is a series of Austin’s lectures, given at Harvard, compounded into chapters. A global perspective of the time frame this act was taught during is the,the cold war, space race, and the beginning of Civil Rights Movement. There were a lot of people talking locally and globally about politics. As a result of The Speech Act, legal theory in politics was more closely scrutinized. Through Austin’s work, the Speech Act Theory arises, which is what he talks about in How To Do Things With Words. Specifically, Austin talks a lot about “performatives.” He says that a performative “indicates that the issue of the utterance is the performing of an action.” Basically, he says that to say something is to do something. Austin acknowledges that some of the concepts are hard to follow and can be looked at as either performatives or constatives, so he gives a list of necessary conditions (A.1, A. 2, B.1, etc.) called infelicities. These clarify why certain statements cannot be performatives. For example, if you were to choose a nonsense statement, premise (A. 2) says that the context must be appropriate for the situation; so someone that sentences a criminal to a life in jail that is not a judge would be categorized under a mistake in the “A” section, or a “misinvocation.” An example of a mistake in (B. 1) section, which talks about execution would be a priest that is marrying two people and says,”...in the name of the father” but skips “the son, and the holy spirit.” The execution was done incorrectly, therefore it classifies as a “misexecution.” Mistakes in both areas are called “misfires.” There are two other “abuses” that deal with the intention of a statement by a speaker. These two are under gammas. If any of these conditions are broken, then the statement in question is no longer felicitous, or satisfied. These conditions give definite guidelines to Austin’s “to speak is to perform” idea. The relevance of The Speech Act Theory can be seen in fields such as linguistics, politics (legal theory), and gender theory in today’s world. The Speech Act Theory gave people the ability to continually dissect and analyze what kind of statements are made to communicate. The relevance of the text to our class I believe has to do with looking more intently at the statements we make to ensure the meaning of the statement. Austin and His Theory on Words and Their Accompanying Actions Michaela Pittman In How To Do Things With Words by JL Austin, it is proposed that the idea that saying words actually accomplishes an action with them; the words literally do something. These utterances are called performative acts, and pertaining to the root word perform, these performative acts are the utterances that accomplish something. Austin uses the example of making bets and naming objects or people. When the speaker says these things, they are actually doing something with them. They are naming something, placing a bet on something, thus doing something. For these performative acts to be valid, the must be accompanied by a certain set of circumstances or actions. To summarize, the conditions to be met consist of having an accepted set of procedures that align with the performative act and all parties involved must perform the procedure to to completion. If these conditions are met, then the performative act is considered happy. If not, then is subsequently considered unhappy. Austin categorizes the performative acts that are considered unhappy to have several different causes, called infelicities. These infelicities could exist as misapplications, flaws, hitches, or insincerities of the utterances. If the performative act is considered infelicitous, this means it is null and void; the action in the utterance was not carried through. Austin brings about a notion that words do not just state things, but when intended, can actually perform something. How To Do Things With Words was published in 1962; in the middle of the Vietnam War. When viewed with historical context, the concept of How To… flows with the anit-war sentiment in America during this time. Many Americans protested the Vietnam War and thought the war could be ended by diplomatic means; in other words, with words. This was a time when, after World War II and the major role propaganda played in it, people were beginning to understand the power that words have. Austin is not only agreeing that words are powerful, but making the observation that they are no longer just words, but actions. Austin’s ideas about words also tie into the ongoing course discussion of power. Saussure recognizes the power that words have when he argues the arbitrariness of language and how we use it. He observed that words have arbitrary attachments to the object, or sign, that they signify. Austin and Saussure both recognize the power language has in its ability to communicate something other than just sounds. Austin’s claim can also be compared with Nietzche’s theory of power and the “eternal return”. Nietzche claims that you are able to will things into existence, just by thinking it. This is relevant because Austin theory fits into Nietzche’s because Austin is claiming that words can perform actions, which is like willing something into existence, i.e., naming a ship. Austin evaluated the difference between an utterance of a statement and an utterance of performative. This distinction allowed him to claim that words can perform actions. His work contributes to the ongoing conversation of language, how it’s used for communication and its influence on people. Althusser and His Ideological State Apparatuses Hannah Meyer Louis Althusser was born on October 16, 1918 in French Algeria. His mother was a devout Roman Catholic, and when his family moved to Lyon, France, he was influenced by Catholic professors and joined a Catholic youth movement. Some critics argue that Althusser’s early Catholic introduction affected the way he interpreted Marx. It was after being captured during World War II, that Althusser first heard the ideals of Marx. While being held at a prisoner of war camp in Northern Germany, he met a communist for the first time. However, during his five year stay at the camp, he acquired mental instability, such as depression, that lasted the rest of his life. Though being at the camp was detrimental to his mental health, a psychoanalyst argued that his war experiences were necessary to Althusser’s philosophical thought. Althusser opens Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses with two theses. The first is that ideology represents the relationship of individuals and their conditions of existence. He states that “it is not their real conditions of existence, their real world, that “men” “represent to themselves” is ideology, but above all it is their relation to those conditions of existence which it represented to them there” (Althusser 694). Basically, he’s stating that ideology is a way to separate men and their existence, as well as that ideology is used by the ruling class to control the masses. In the second thesis, Althusser states that ideology has a material existence; he makes the point that ideas and representations don’t have a spiritual existence, but rather, a material one. These two theses combine to prove a third thesis, that the ruling class uses ideology to stay in power (and continue dominating over the lower classes) by controlling things such as beliefs and values. Ideological state apparatuses, or ISA, is achieved through multiple different connections, such as politics, religion, media outlets, educational institutions, familial connections, and sports clubs. ISA spreads ideologies that reinforce the control of the dominant class, and people adapt these ideologies due to their fear of being isolated and ostracized. Althusser proposes that people are subjects, even before birth due to their familial ideology. This idea is that children are labeled as “workers” before they are even born, due to their social class. This concept is interesting, due to the fact that Althusser’s parents belonged to the “petit-bourgeois,” which was a small group of people who were semi-independent peasants and small-scale merchants who seek to identify with the haute (high) bourgeoisie. Their beliefs and ideological stances reflect those of the haute bourgeoisie, who attempt to imitate those of higher social class. Though the World War II prisoner-of-war camp helped him develop some of his ideologies and introduced him to Marxism, it had lasting effects on his mental health. Besides depression, Althusser also suffered from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and from the 1950s onward, he was under serious medical supervision. He went through various aggressive treatments, such as electroconvulsive therapy and narco-analysis, as well as practicing self-medication. Althusser, with the help of a psychoanalyst, came to the realization that some of his problems dealt with his family; his parents constantly fought and hardly loved him, something he struggled with. In 1976, Althusser admitted to spending 15 of the last 30 years in hospitals, and in 1980, Althusser strangled his wife, but was not put on trial due to insanity. He later died in 1990 of a heart attack. Paige Hartenburg Philosophers are often influenced by their predecessors. This is the case for Louis Althusser, a French Marxist philosopher born in October 1918. Althusser was an active (although somewhat critical) member of the French Communist Party and follower of Structural Marxism, which views the state as the direct servant of the capitalist elite. Althusser believed in the philosophy proposed by Karl Marx, Antonio Gramsci, Jacques Derrida, and Sigmund Freud. These ideas and influences are reflected in, Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses, which explores the nature of subordination. In the beginning of the essay, Althusser proposes two opposing theses: that ideology is an imaginary relationship between individuals to their existence, and the other which places ideology as a material entity. Within the first thesis, Althusser believes ideology is used by the ruling class as a way of controlling the masses, and to create an alienation between men and the actuality of their existence. The second thesis places ideology as material, existing within a state apparatus. These two theories combine to create Althusser's final point: ideology is a material way for the ruling class to stay in power by controlling the values, morals, and beliefs of the subjects. The ideological state apparatuses or ISA, is achieved through several different methods including: religion, political parties, familiar connections, literature, art, the media, and education. Within this theory, Althusser places ideology as being possible through indoctrination of social classism. This creates a positive feedback loop, turning individuals into subjects furthering the spread the idea of subjects, indoctrinating those individuals as subjects. Althusser continues this concept by stating that individuals are subjects since before birth, as society labels the child through family ideology. It is through this never-ending cycle that the means of production are assured. Since the socio-technical divisions of labor are assigned at birth, when the labor force continues to reproduce, more people are assigned to the role of “worker”. Within the concept of Structural Marxism, Althusser philosophy confirms the belief that capitalism is used by the ruling class to keep a certain group in power, that society creates social division between two groups for the purpose of labor. As his life progressed, Althusser developed extreme schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Over the years he would undergo several psychological treatments such as electroconvulsive therapy, narco-analysis (aka “truth serum”) and psychoanalysis which prevented him from continuing his philosophical development . During one of his later hospital stays, Althusser strangled his wife Helene in a hallucinogenic episode claiming to have saved her from her own depression. This attacked gave Althusser extreme media attention, tarnishing his record as a philosopher. Although Althusser died of a heart attack in 1990, his legacy lives on through his impact on Structural Marxism, which is still used in the political science field. Althusser also had a major influence on the future of Marxist philosophy, impacting philosophers such as Pierre Bourdieu, Slavoji Žižek, Judith Butler, Michel Foucault, and Pierre Macherey (these are all philosophers mentioned in our textbook however his influence stretches a lot further than these writers) Category:Browse Category:Freud; Psychoanalysis; Unconscious thought Category:Freud Category:The Uncanny Category:"Double" Category:Repetition Compulsion Category:Id Category:Ego Category:Super Ego Category:Necessary conditions Category:Linguistics Category:Say what you mean Category:Speak into action Category:The Speech Act Theory Category:Austin Category:How To Do Things With Words Category:Performatives